SAD says AAP govt got jittery after its chief exposed Rs 500 cr 'excise scam'

Chandigarh, August 26: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal, on Thursday demanded a probe against the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) over an alleged Rs 500 crore excise scam in Punjab. In a statement, senior SAD leaders Prof Prem Singh Chandumajra, Sikander Singh Maluka and Virsa Singh Valtoha said “this is a clear case of a minister trying to influence a case which is under investigation. The AAP government is following in the footsteps of the erstwhile Congress government to launch a witch hunt against its political opponents”. Also Read: Gangster Mandeep Manali of Bambiha gang shot dead in Philippines The SAD leaders said the minister had announced that Sukhbir Badal was guilty in the Kotkapura firing incident even before completion of investigation in the case. “Is he the investigating officer in the case? It seems the AAP government wants to coerce police officers to implicate senior SAD leaders in the case fraudulently”. The leaders also asked the SIT head to clarify if he had been given directions to frame the SAD president and senior leaders in the case. Asserting that Dhaliwal’s statement indicated that the AAP government was bent upon vendetta politics, the SAD leaders said “Sukhbir Badal is yet to join investigation in the case and has been summoned by the SIT on August 30 but the AAP government has already delivered its judgment in the case”. They said this was being done despite the fact that no Commission or court had indicted Sukhbir Badal in any case concerning police firing or the Bargari sacrilege case in which he had got a clean chit. Prof Chandumajra, Maluka and Valtoha said Dhaliwal’s statement had followed an outburst by former IG and AAP legislator Kunwar Vijay Pratap Singh who had earlier tried his best to implicate senior SAD leaders while serving in the police force. They said the Punjab and Haryana high court had questioned the impartiality of the former IG while quashing all charge sheets filed by the SIT in the Kotkapura firing case. Furthermore, they added, “This is the reality and Kunwar Vijay Pratap should come to terms with it. The high court had even directed the State government to reconstitute a new SIT sans Kunwar Vijay Partap”. Prof Chandumajra asserted the AAP government had gone on overdrive to level false allegations against the SAD President because the latter had exposed the entire excise scam and detailed how Rs 500 crore was looted from the State exchequer by doubling the profit of selected licensees and receiving kickbacks from them. “The SAD will not relent from its commitment to ensuring punishment to all those who have looted the State exchequer at the behest of the AAP high command including Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia and MP Raghav Chadha. We will be filing a formal complaint against them with the CBI and the ED and will also urge the Punjab Governor to order a free and fair inquiry into the scam. We are confident that all senior AAP leaders involved in this scam will go behind bars soon”, the SAD leaders asserted.   -PTC News